William Herschel Conducts Poem Rhyme Scheme and Analysis
Rhyme Scheme: ABCDEFG HIJKLMNOPQRSTUVWXYZA 2B2C2D2E2F2G2 H2I2YJ2K2JIGL2M2I2N2 O2P2C2Q2R2S2T2 JU2V2W2X2VY2Z2A3MB3C 3LG2D3M2E3F3G3E2O2H3 A2A2I3 AJ3VK3L3IM3A3N3O3P3G 2E3H3Q3R3MS3T3VM2U3O 2V3U3S2W3X3Y3U3U3Z3U 3U3A4U3U3W3B4Z3U3SU3 Z3S3C4O2U3D3V U3U3R2M2D4S3E4D4VQF4 Z3Z3LQQZ3U3U3QF4S3QQ QG4H4Z3D3QZ3VU3D3K3U 3QI4QQJ4D3K4L4M4F4Z3 F4QU3QZ3C4U3QU3VQWas it a dream that crowded concert room | A |
In Bath that sea of ruffles and laced coats | B |
And William Herschel in his powdered wig | C |
Waiting upon the platform to conduct | D |
His choir and Linley's orchestra He stood | E |
Tapping his music rest lost in his own thoughts | F |
And did I hear or dream them all were mine | G |
- | |
My periwig's askew my ruffle stained | H |
With grease from my new telescope | I |
Ach to morrow | J |
How Caroline will be vexed although she grows | K |
Almost as bad as I who cannot leave | L |
My work shop for one evening | M |
I must give | N |
One last recital at St Margaret's | O |
And then farewell to music | P |
Who can lead | Q |
Two lives at once | R |
Yet it has taught me much | S |
Thrown curious lights upon our world to pass | T |
From one life to another Much that I took | U |
For substance turns to shadow I shall see | V |
No throngs like this again wring no more praise | W |
Out of their hearts forego that instant joy | X |
Let those who have not known it count it vain | Y |
When human souls at once respond to yours | Z |
Here on the brink of fortune and of fame | A2 |
As men account these things the moment comes | B2 |
When I must choose between them and the stars | C2 |
And I have chosen | D2 |
Handel good old friend | E2 |
We part to night Hereafter I must watch | F2 |
That other wand to which the worlds keep time | G2 |
- | |
What has decided me That marvelous night | H2 |
When ah how difficult it will be to guide | I2 |
With all these wonders whirling through my brain | Y |
After a Pump room concert I came home | J2 |
Hot foot out of the fluttering sea of fans | K2 |
Coquelicot ribboned belles and periwigged beaux | J |
To my Newtonian telescope | I |
The design | G |
Was his but more than half the joy my own | L2 |
Because it was the work of my own hand | M2 |
A new one with an eye six inches wide | I2 |
Better than even the best that Newton made | N2 |
Then as I turned it on the Gemini | O2 |
And the deep stillness of those constant lights | P2 |
Castor and Pollux lucid pilot stars | C2 |
Began to calm the fever of my blood | Q2 |
I saw O first of all mankind I saw | R2 |
The disk of my new planet gliding there | S2 |
Beyond our tumults in that realm of peace | T2 |
- | |
What will they christen it Ach not Herschel no | J |
Nor Georgium Sidus as I once proposed | U2 |
Although he scarce could lose it as he lost | V2 |
That world in 'seventy six | W2 |
Indeed so far | X2 |
From trying to tax it he has granted me | V |
How much two hundred golden pounds a year | Y2 |
In the great name of science half the cost | Z2 |
Of one state coach with all those worlds to win | A3 |
Well well we must be grateful This mad king | M |
Has done far more than all the worldly wise | B3 |
Who'll charge even this to madness | C3 |
I believe | L |
One day he'll have me pardoned for that crime | G2 |
When I escaped deserted some would say | D3 |
From those drill sergeants in my native land | M2 |
Deserted drill for music as I now | E3 |
Desert my music for the orchestral spheres | F3 |
No This new planet is only new to man | G3 |
His majesty has done much Yet as my friend | E2 |
Declared last night Never did monarch buy | O2 |
Honour so cheaply and he has not bought it | H3 |
I think that it should bear some ancient name | A2 |
And wear it like a crown some deep dark name | A2 |
Like Uranus known to remoter gods | I3 |
- | |
How strange it seems this buzzing concert room | A |
There's Doctor Burney bowing and behind him | J3 |
His fox eyed daughter Fanny | V |
Is it a dream | K3 |
These crowding midgets dense as clustering bees | L3 |
In some great bee skep | I |
Now as I lift my wand | M3 |
A silence grips them and the strings begin | A3 |
Throbbing The faint lights flicker in gusts of sound | N3 |
Before me glimmering like a crescent moon | O3 |
The dim half circle of the choir awaits | P3 |
Its own appointed time | G2 |
Beside me now | E3 |
Watching my wand plump and immaculate | H3 |
From buckled shoes to that white bunch of lace | Q3 |
Under his chin the midget tenor rises | R3 |
Music in hand a linnet and a king | M |
The bullfinch bass that other emperor | S3 |
Leans back indifferently and clears his throat | T3 |
As if to say This prelude leads to Me | V |
While on their own proud thrones on either hand | M2 |
The sumptuously bosomed midget queens | U3 |
Contralto and soprano jealously eye | O2 |
Each other's plumage | V3 |
Round me the music throbs | U3 |
With an immortal passion I grow aware | S2 |
Of an appalling mystery We this throng | W3 |
Of midgets playing listening tense and still | X3 |
Are sailing on a midget ball of dust | Y3 |
We call our planet will have sailed through space | U3 |
Ten thousand leagues before this music ends | U3 |
What does it mean Oh God what can it mean | Z3 |
This weird hushed ant hill with a thousand eyes | U3 |
These midget periwigs all those little blurs | U3 |
Tier over tier of faces masks of flesh | A4 |
Corruptible hiding each its hopes and dreams | U3 |
Its tragi comic dreams | U3 |
And all this throng | W3 |
Will be forgotten mixed with dust crushed out | B4 |
Before this book of music is outworn | Z3 |
Or that tall organ crumbles Violins | U3 |
Outlast their players Other hands may touch | S |
That harpsichord but ere this planet makes | U3 |
Another threescore journeys round its sun | Z3 |
These breathing listeners will have vanished Whither | S3 |
I watch my moving hands and they grow strange | C4 |
What is it moves this body What am I | O2 |
How came I here a ghost to hear that voice | U3 |
Of infinite compassion far away | D3 |
Above the throbbing strings hark Comfort ye | V |
- | |
If music lead us to a cry like this | U3 |
I think I shall not lose it in the skies | U3 |
I do but follow its own secret law | R2 |
As long ago I sought to understand | M2 |
Its golden mathematics taught myself | D4 |
The way to lay one stone upon another | S3 |
Before I dared to dream that I might build | E4 |
My Holy City of Song I gave myself | D4 |
To all its branches How they stared at me | V |
Those men of sensibility when I said | Q |
That algebra conic sections fluxions all | F4 |
Pertained to music Let them stare again | Z3 |
Old Kepler knew by instinct what I now | Z3 |
Desire to learn I have resolved to leave | L |
No tract of heaven unvisited | Q |
To night | Q |
The music carries me back to it again | Z3 |
I see beyond this island universe | U3 |
Beyond our sun and all those other suns | U3 |
That throng the Milky Way far far beyond | Q |
A thousand little wisps faint nebulae | F4 |
Luminous fans and milky streaks of fire | S3 |
Some like soft brushes of electric mist | Q |
Streaming from one bright point others that spread | Q |
And branch like growing systems others discrete | Q |
Keen ripe with stars in clusters others drawn back | G4 |
By central forces into one dense death | H4 |
Thence to be kindled into fire reborn | Z3 |
And scattered abroad once more in a delicate spray | D3 |
Faint as the mist by one bright dewdrop breathed | Q |
At dawn and yet a universe like our own | Z3 |
Each wisp a universe a vast galaxy | V |
Wide as our night of stars | U3 |
The Milky Way | D3 |
In which our sun is drowned to these would seem | K3 |
Less than to us their faintest drift of haze | U3 |
Yet we who are borne on one dark grain of dust | Q |
Around one indistinguishable spark | I4 |
Of star mist lost in one lost feather of light | Q |
Can by the strength of our own thought ascend | Q |
Through universe after universe trace their growth | J4 |
Through boundless time their glory their decay | D3 |
And on the invisible road of law more firm | K4 |
Than granite range through all their length and breadth | L4 |
Their height and depth past present and to come | M4 |
So those who follow the great Work master's law | F4 |
From small things up to great may one day learn | Z3 |
The structure of the heavens discern the whole | F4 |
Within the part as men through Love see God | Q |
Oh holy night deep night of stars whose peace | U3 |
Descends upon the troubled mind like dew | Q |
Healing it with the sense of that pure reign | Z3 |
Of constant law enduring through all change | C4 |
Shall I not one day after faithful years | U3 |
Find that thy heavens are built on music too | Q |
And hear once more above thy throbbing worlds | U3 |
This voice of all compassion Comfort ye | V |
Yes comfort ye my people saith your God | Q |
Alfred Noyes
(1)
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